Allen 50

Still on the subject of the flooding, does anyone know how often the lock gates on the Alsace Canal get jammed by high water? Must be a frequent occurrence.

In sixty years of touring holidays in mainland Europe we have frequently ‘prepared for the worst and hoped for the best’. Many crises have been dealt with, especially when riding or driving vintage motor bikes and cars. More recently we switched to rail travel and have had few problems there, even if some of the hotels were not quite as expected. Patience and good humour were in plentiful supply. After helping us re-metal six vintage car big ends in St Anton, Austria, the garage lads presented us with edelweiss flowers that they had gathered on the mountain above and the garage owner shut the shop early and bought drinks all round!

For our first river cruise we were entirely unprepared to lose all the money that we had paid in expectation of a luxury holiday. Despite days of adverse weather forecasts. the boat had been stranded in the Alsace canal. Given that problem, we should have been offered the possibility of cancelling as required by the Package Travel Regulations 1992. We did not expect to be offered a gruelling cheap coach tour instead of an interesting cruise down the Rhine valley.

The ‘Allclear’ usually good travel insurance seems restricted to health cover and will not consider this claim. Emerald have certainly succeeded in putting us off river cruising for life.

The choices offered by Emerald were not good. In view of the high rainfall and weather forecasts they would have done better not to trap the Emerald Sky in the canal. They could have transported passengers by road or rail and avoided being trapped.

Having been trapped they should have offered cancellation prior to boarding but did not.

We expected to admire the scenery from a comfortable cabin rather than being transferred to a cheap coach tour. The video ‘Emerald Sky Jewels of the Rhine’ on Youtube shows it well.

The excursions left us both exhausted and with swollen ankles that took time to recover back home.

We have also been sent the vouchers which are useless for next year’s rail tour.